Is an oil free future even possible with current and forseeable future technology?

[Xellos2099]

Well, its arguably the cause of many wars of the 20th and 21st century (since the industrial revolution) and also the cause of most of the really bad environmental disasters the world has known. And even when things are just fine it still generates loads of pollution during normal use. And it takes millions of years for the planet to produce so once we use it up, thats it.
Eventually we will have to find something new, and it makes sense to start looking ASAP. The most successful civilizations are the ones who look to the future.

EDIT:
As far as how much oil we use: We really need to make it more efficient. Hybrid card are a step in the right direction, but frankly the Prius is the only one to get it right, and its a piece of junk. By constrast the Hybrid Highlander, (which is a nice vehicle), only gets 28 miles per gallon vs. 24 for the standard model. Thats really not good enough to justify the extra 6 grand on the price tag. We need to make ALL cars much more efficient, especially the big redneck rigs and delivery trucks.

To made car more efficient, we would need to reduce its overall weight. However, reducing ti would also reduce the safety level of the car; government regulation won't allow that. I wo

 

[shortylickens]

To made car more efficient, we would need to reduce its overall weight. However, reducing ti would also reduce the safety level of the car; government regulation won't allow that. I wo

Umm, you are wrong for many reasons.
1st, no, making it smaller would NOT increase efficiency. You would have the same poor efficiency but just be doing a smaller job. Yes that would waste less gas but that would also get less work done. Granted, most Americans dont need the oversized behemoths they do now, but I would like to worry about the efficiency at which we turn gasoline into energy and then worry about the amount used later on. If you dont understand ask the guys in the Highly Technical forum.

2nd, the government does allow small cars on the road. I dont agree with it for safety reasons but it does happen. When I lived in Ridgecrest the city government allowed golf carts on roads. People liked the idea of saving money but I didnt care for slow death traps all over the place. Actually, that must have been a state of California thing cuz the suckers did have licence plates. Anyway, I didnt care for it, and I hope they stopped doing it.
And then theres the Smart Cars. Least aptly named vehicle ever designed. Those things are death traps too, but again they are legal under current law. The problem is they are still just as inefficient as any other vehicle at burning fuel and providing forward momentum.
The hybrids are a step in the right direction but as I said before, they provide only a minor benefit on normal vehicles. We need to work harder at reducing the wasted energy.

 

[Daedalus685]

Again, where do you get the electricity? From wind? How efficient is wind? It is not free is it? No you need to build the wind plants. Even then, you only harvest a certain amount of wind the earth produces. How about solar? You need to make the solar cells. Even then, you can't harvest all of the sun's power.

Do you understand what I'm saying? There is no way to compare efficiency between fuels because efficiency doesn't matter in this case.

If I had magic pellets that was .0001% efficient but still cost 50% less to produce the same amount of work as gasoline, would I still use the pellets? Of course!

You are entirely correct that cost is important.. which is a major reason we still use oil... however this is short sighted in many ways.

However, you are forgetting that electricity is a means created to use power we produce, it is of itself not really a fuel. Also keep in mind that we have to use energy to refine oil, the final efficiency being the work we put in vs the work we get out. To use electricity instead of combustion is far more efficient in the 'end' with creation efficiency and cost up for improvement, though as I said most methods are on the order of 30%, akin to the use of oil.

That being said, I am certainly for the expense of capitol now in order to give us energy tomorrow. We will have to do this and could easily save a fortune in the long (even relatively short) run. One can not only focus on the cost today when making these choices. Oil will run out, there is no way around that, it will cost a bloody ridiculous amount of money to switch if we don't do it gradually and start today.

 

[Elias824]

Damn you Henry ford!

 

[Patranus]

Umm, you are wrong for many reasons.
1st, no, making it smaller would NOT increase efficiency. You would have the same poor efficiency but just be doing a smaller job. Yes that would waste less gas but that would also get less work done. Granted, most Americans dont need the oversized behemoths they do now, but I would like to worry about the efficiency at which we turn gasoline into energy and then worry about the amount used later on. If you dont understand ask the guys in the Highly Technical forum.

2nd, the government does allow small cars on the road. I dont agree with it for safety reasons but it does happen. When I lived in Ridgecrest the city government allowed golf carts on roads. People liked the idea of saving money but I didnt care for slow death traps all over the place. Actually, that must have been a state of California thing cuz the suckers did have licence plates. Anyway, I didnt care for it, and I hope they stopped doing it.
And then theres the Smart Cars. Least aptly named vehicle ever designed. Those things are death traps too, but again they are legal under current law. The problem is they are still just as inefficient as any other vehicle at burning fuel and providing forward momentum.
The hybrids are a step in the right direction but as I said before, they provide only a minor benefit on normal vehicles. We need to work harder at reducing the wasted energy.

Electric cars "save" money.....right.

 

[Greenman]

Because it won't meet worldwide energy needs in the relatively near future, driving up the cost of everything and leading to a Depression like we've never seen unless some other means of producing energy is found before that happens.

Only an idiot waits to slam on the brakes once he runs into the wall.

We don't really need a way of producing energy, it's pouring down on our heads every day. What we desperately need is a bucket to catch it in and place to store it.

 

[shortylickens]

Electric cars "save" money.....right.

I'm sorry, who were you trying to quote?

 

[Double Trouble]

Well, USA can for example stop using on average twice as much oil per person compared to EU (its easy to do - just create tax of 3$ per gallon ).

It also wouldnt hurt USA to create good mass transport system like what we have in EU.

The EU is also much smaller and densely packed, thus making it much more efficient to create many mass transit options. That simply doesn't make sense for the US. More taxes would just do nothing but destroy the economy. I guess that would reduce oil consumption, but it's not desirable by any means.

Having lived in Europe, I'm soooooo glad I'm no longer forced into mass transit for everything, I can drive where I want when I want. One of the many reasons I moved to the US.

 

[rchiu]

If someone has the expertise to opine on this topic I'd really like them to show it. This is ultimately an engineering / science question and partisan hacks are not going to be able to provide you with a decent answer.

With that said, isn't the scientific consensus that there are not unlimited oil reserves in the world? And isn't the scientific consensus that it takes millions of years for new oil to form? With that in mind I really hope our scientists and engineers are able to develop competitive substitutes. Otherwise we are probably up shit creek. Maybe not in our life time but in the foreseeable future.

Naa, it's more of a economics question. It's not that there is no alternative to oil, there is, they are just not as cheap (or as feared in case of nuclear energy) as oil. American has the highest oil consumption per capita because it's cheap, if oil in the US is as expensive as Europe, consumption would decrease.

So if you find an alternative that's cheaper than oil and plentiful to meet the world wide demand, then yes, oil free future is possible. Or when oil supply is depleted to the point that the market price make it so expensive that alternative option is cheaper, then oil would be replaced.

Either way, the economics or how expensive gas/oil is relative to the replacement will determine if oil free future becomes a reality.

 

[Danube]

There is a guy now that has a way of extracting energy from any point in space just like Tesla speculated was possible. GM approached him last year but when the gov took GM over he dropped them. Russians were also interested. His work changes understanding of gravity which is a push more than a pull.

 

[evident]

if we had a japan-style rail system on the east coast from boston to DC, that would be a great start. and then one on the west coast from san fran to san diego.

 

[Jadow]

I think people will be able to self generate a lot of the power they use at home with things like solar, geothermal, and wind.

However for transportation, we are going to be using oil for a LONG time. Hopefully cellulosic ethanol can be made more efficient down the road.

 

[Elias824]

I think people will be able to self generate a lot of the power they use at home with things like solar, geothermal, and wind.

However for transportation, we are going to be using oil for a LONG time. Hopefully cellulosic ethanol can be made more efficient down the road.

If only we would import sugar cane or at least stop propping up corn based ethanol.

 

[epidemis]

I can see it now...
They develop a way to extract energy from the air.
BP develops the technology. Everyone cheers.
But something goes terrible wrong one day with the process and all the air on Earth is suddenly turned to slug.
All humanity dies in within 30 seconds.
Welcome to out of control un-regulated technologies of tomorrow.
Have a nice day...

Uh, we already have that, it's called wind turbines

 

[desy]

Damn, late to my fav subject

Oil free is a laudable goal but unrealistic
Its too usefull

Electricity can be made many ways and we will pursue all avenues to create it cost competatively, and should be agressively moving away from fossil generation

Transportation fuels is a lot tougher because that what give us our freedom and thats what a car really is, independance. Its why in NA we don't want to live population dense and desire to live in suburbs. If we didn't they wouldn't exist and LARGE cars were once described as the ultimate luxury not all the bells and whistles. My uncle traded in his 1L engined vehicle in Denmark when we were there last summer cause he wanted the oomph of the 1.2L
A car IS freedom

Changing to other technologies is desirable for a multitude of reasons from emissions to foreign dependance, price volitility etc. However there lies the challenge as there is NOTHING scalable to replace the technology we currently have as cheaply as we have it.
Someday maybe but nothing currently and its a real problem

Yes there is lots of oil but at what price now that we are coming up against production constraints? Optimists think we can transition smoothly without a lot of societial disruptions, doomers have us back at 1 Billion on earth cause thats the carry capacity of humans on the planet without oil.

Put me somewhere in the middle going forward, best is over the next 10 yrs to keep your personal debt to a minimum. Have a preparedness plan where you can feed your family for months if need be and be multi-talented. That is learn to garden, carpentry, something to diversify your marketable talents

 

[Budarow]

Not that it would happen anytime soon because the big oil firms and politians won't let it, but why not build many solar arrays and wind farms and use the electricity to produce hydrogen fuels which would then be transported all over the country using the existing pipeline infrastructure system?

If you've ever seen a map of all the bulk underground pipelines running across the country, you'd be floored at how many there are and the coverage of the U.S. is immense.

There are natural gas, LP, heavy oil and gasoline pipelines all over the place.

The big downside of solar and wind power is "storage" of the power to cover demand when its needed. When the wind or sun dies down, no power so it has to be stored somehow. Batteries is where storage is headed which IMO is a crappy way to do it. Producing hydrogen fuels could be the "storage" mechanism instead of batteries.

We could convert cars, power plants, homes, etc. into hydrogen based systems.

I don't know much about hydrogen fuels but seems like it would work really well and the cost would be manageable and no more global warming.

 

[desy]

Critics charge that the time frame for overcoming the technical and economic challenges to implementing wide-scale use of hydrogen vehicles is likely to be at least several decades, and hydrogen vehicles may never become broadly available.[43][63] They believe that the focus on the use of the hydrogen car is a dangerous detour from more readily available solutions to reducing the use of fossil fuels in vehicles.[64] In May 2008, Wired News reported that "experts say it will be 40 years or more before hydrogen has any meaningful impact on gasoline consumption or global warming, and we can't afford to wait that long. In the meantime, fuel cells are diverting resources from more immediate solutions."[65]

K. G. Duleep speculates that "a strong case exists for continuing fuel-efficiency improvements from conventional technology at relatively low cost."[66] Critiques of hydrogen vehicles are presented in the 2006 documentary, Who Killed the Electric Car?. According to former U.S. Department of Energy official Joseph Romm, "A hydrogen car is one of the least efficient, most expensive ways to reduce greenhouse gases." Asked when hydrogen cars will be broadly available, Romm replied: "Not in our lifetime, and very possibly never."[66] The Los Angeles Times wrote, in February 2009, "Hydrogen fuel-cell technology won't work in cars.... Any way you look at it, hydrogen is a lousy way to move cars."[67] A 2007 article in Technology Review stated, "In the context of the overall energy economy, a car like the BMW Hydrogen 7 would probably produce far more carbon dioxide emissions than gasoline-powered cars available today. And changing this calculation would take multiple breakthroughs – which study after study has predicted will take decades, if they arrive at all. In fact, the Hydrogen 7 and its hydrogen-fuel-cell cousins are, in many ways, simply flashy distractions produced by automakers who should be taking stronger immediate action to reduce the greenhouse-gas emissions of their cars."[43][68]

The Wall Street Journal reported in 2008 that "Top executives from General Motors Corp. and Toyota Motor Corp. Tuesday expressed doubts about the viability of hydrogen fuel cells for mass-market production in the near term and suggested their companies are now betting that electric cars will prove to be a better way to reduce fuel consumption and cut tailpipe emissions on a large scale."[6][69] In addition, Ballard Power Systems, a leading developer of hydrogen vehicle technology, pulled back from the Hydrogen vehicle business in late 2007. Research Capital analyst Jon Hykawy concluded that Ballard saw the industry going nowhere and said: "In my view, the hydrogen car was never alive. The problem was never could you build a fuel cell that would consume hydrogen, produce electricity, and fit in a car. The problem was always, can you make hydrogen fuel at a price point that makes any sense to anybody. And the answer to that to date has been no."[70]. In December 2009, however, Ballard announced a three-year contract for the delivery of the FCvelocity fuel cells for Daimler Benz.[71]

The Economist magazine, in September 2008, quoted Robert Zubrin, the author of Energy Victory, as saying: "Hydrogen is 'just about the worst possible vehicle fuel'".[72] The magazine noted the withdrawal of California from earlier goals: "In March [2008] the California Air Resources Board, an agency of California's state government and a bellwether for state governments across America, changed its requirement for the number of zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs) to be built and sold in California between 2012 and 2014. The revised mandate allows manufacturers to comply with the rules by building more battery-electric cars instead of fuel-cell vehicles."[72] The magazine also noted that most hydrogen is produced through steam reformation, which creates at least as much emission of carbon per mile as some of today's gasoline cars. On the other hand, if the hydrogen could be produced using renewable energy, "it would surely be easier simply to use this energy to charge the batteries of all-electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles."[72]

On May 2009 the U.S. Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu announced that since fuel cell hydrogen vehicles "will not be practical over the next 10 to 20 years", the U.S. government would "cut off funds" for development of hydrogen vehicles, although the DoE will continue to fund research related to stationary fuel cells. He cited difficulties in the development of the required infrastructure to distribute hydrogen as a justification for cutting research funds.[73] The National Hydrogen Association and other hydrogen groups criticized the decision.[74] Secretary Chu told MIT's Technology Review that he is skeptical about hydrogen's use in transportation because "the way we get hydrogen primarily is from reforming [natural] gas.... You're giving away some of the energy content of natural gas.... So that's one problem.... [For] transportation, we don't have a good storage mechanism yet.... The fuel cells aren't there yet, and the distribution infrastructure isn't there yet.... In order to get significant deployment, you need four significant technological breakthroughs.... If you need four miracles, that's unlikely: saints only need three miracles".[75] Congress overrode the administration's proposal, restoring funding for hydrogen car research in its appropriations bill for 2010.[7]

The Washington Post asked in November 2009, "But why would you want to store energy in the form of hydrogen and then use that hydrogen to produce electricity for a motor, when electrical energy is already waiting to be sucked out of sockets all over America and stored in auto batteries...?" The paper concluded that commercializing hydrogen cars is "stupendously difficult and probably pointless. That's why, for the foreseeable future, the hydrogen car will remain a tailpipe dream".[47] Digital Trends reported that a December 2009 study at UC Davis, published in the Journal of Power Sources, found that, over their lifetimes, hydrogen vehicles will emit more carbon than gasoline vehicles.[76]

 

[Patranus]

Nowsday I seen all sort of people said that we should kick our oil habit, but is it even possible? Everything use oil, from cars to boat to airplane to even plastic. People LOVE to blame it is our demand for oil that cause this accident, but it is not. It was solely on the incompetent of the US inspector to the cost cutting action from the BP that cause this accident. Even if we completely stop using oil tomorrow, every other countries in the world will use it and they will use it happily too. The best we could do is to start building more nuclear reactor, that will decrease the need for oil. We also got no replacement for plastic either.

Now unless US government is giving everyone that have a car an electric car, our demand for oil won't drop anytime soon, people needs car to get to work and any family bigger than 5 most likely need a suv unless they got at least 2-3 cars, but that would double the gas usage won't we? The matter of fact is, US is simply too big to travel for just public transportation. If someone need to drive 1 hour to work, it will take twice or triple amount of time by the way of public transportation, not really efficient, right?

Why would anyone care?

Oil is cheap and plentiful. Pretty sure no one outside of those whack job "progressives" wants to go oil free but that is only because they want Americans to give up their luxury items and live like its a 3rd world country.

 

[William Gaatjes]

If oil would only be used for products and no as fuel for ICE, there would be enough for another 600 years. (Keeping in mind the gradual increase in knowledge to invent replacements which excel the natural oily forms).

Electricity is the best way to go. Local underground nuclear power plants, for each city or village. Just scaled up for the amount of citizens. Use of solar and wind only to store energy to power cooling and heating systems for the households. It is possible. Combine it with biological production of hydrogen to produce electricity as well and you are good to go. You could even combine the two and use the nuclear heat and weaker forms of radiation to power artificial engineered bacteria to create hydrogen while feeding them human waste.

Same is possible for farming and food production. Keep it local and small. When you do this, less pesticides are needed. Healthier food will be produced.
Healthier vegetables and fruit. Real healthy meat until artificial meat is fully possible and tastes the same. Traveling and transport is less and possible with electrical vehicles because of the smaller distances. While at the same time creating jobs for the people living in the city/village. Because it all needs maintenance and the food needs to be processed. Less stress, Less worries.
Then there is still the technical side. Many jobs there as well, to keep on improving...

Some examples of bacteria capable of some fancy tricks that could be used for power generation :

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/19/AR2006101901671.html

First, water molecules -- H2O -- are split by radioactive particles. The result is hydrogen, oxygen and hydrogen peroxide. The latter two substances then attack the mineral pyrite (also known as iron sulfide or "fool's gold"), making sulfate through a process called oxidation.

The bacteria then uses the hydrogen to turn the sulfate back to sulfide, a process known as reduction. In doing so, it captures some of the energy in the sulfate's chemical bonds, which it uses to make ATP, the molecule that is the universal coin of energy exchange in living things.

Radiation then splits more water, producing more hydrogen peroxide, which turns the sulfide back to sulfate, effectively "recharging the battery."

The deep underground water where the bacteria live is loaded with these nutrients. But the exceedingly torpid organisms are using only a fraction -- perhaps as little as one-billionth -- of what is available to them. They live 45 to 300 years between cell divisions; in comparison, some strains of E. coli bacteria can divide every 20 minutes under ideal conditions.

"For some reason it is advantageous to grow slow rather than fast in this environment," said Lisa M. Pratt, a geologist and astrobiologist at Indiana University, who is one the authors of the Science paper.

"Philosophically, that is very interesting, because on the surface it is advantageous to grow fast and use nutrients before something else does," she added.

All of the microbes are members of the phylum Firmicutes . One strain dominates, and there are a few others.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091214151931.htm

http://shkrobius.livejournal.com/49484.html

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090908193444.htm

One of my favourites because it kicks people against nuclear energy generation but who are in favour of coal, oil and solar only in the nuts :
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/05/080505072838.htm

The researchers found evidence that fungi can "lock" depleted uranium into a mineral form that may be less likely to find its way into plants, animals, or the water supply.

"This work provides yet another example of the incredible properties of microorganisms in effecting transformations of metals and minerals in the natural environment," said Geoffrey Gadd of the University of Dundee in Scotland. "Because fungi are perfectly suited as biogeochemical agents, often dominate the biota in polluted soils, and play a major role in the establishment and survival of plants through their association with roots, fungal-based approaches should not be neglected in remediation attempts for metal-polluted soils."

The testing of depleted-uranium ammunition and its recent use in Iraq and the Balkans has led to contamination of the environment with the unstable metal, Gadd explained. Depleted uranium differs from natural uranium in the balance of isotopes it contains. It is the byproduct of uranium enrichment for use in nuclear reactors or nuclear weapons and is valued for its very high density. Although less radioactive than natural uranium, depleted uranium is just as toxic and poses a threat to people.

In the new study, the researchers found that free-living and plant symbiotic (mycorrhizal) fungi can colonize depleted-uranium surfaces and transform the metal into uranyl phosphate minerals.

While they probably still pose some threat, he said, "The fungal-produced minerals are capable of long-term uranium retention, so this may help prevent uptake of uranium by plants, animals, and microbes. It might also prevent the spent uranium from leaching out from the soil."

 

[Fear No Evil]

Yeah and you would see 50 CC Mopeds that get 99 MPG start selling like hot cakes!

I say more like a $5.00 tax! That would send it up to about 7.70 a gallon. I think it would be wonderful! I'd love to see the people squirm and try to bitch and moan why the can't drive their hummers or caddilacs that get 12 MPG.

I think we should just do it now!

I'd love to tax pot $500 an ounce and watch you potheads squirm as well.

 

[Vic]

Why would anyone care?

Oil is cheap and plentiful. Pretty sure no one outside of those whack job "progressives" wants to go oil free but that is only because they want Americans to give up their luxury items and live like its a 3rd world country.

I know! We should have stayed with the horse and buggy!

Whack job "conservatives" like you would keep us from moving into the future until we become like a 3rd world country.

Once the issues with battery technology are finally resolved, and electric cars are competitive with gasoline cars with regards to cruising range, refueling time, and cost, then everyone will drive electric cars. And not because the govt will force them or because oil is some kind of luxury, but because electric motors are superior to ICEs in almost every way. Repeat after me: "maximum torque at 0 rpm." A practical electric car would blow the doors off any comparable gasoline car. Just look at the Tesla.

Will there ever be an oil free future? No, even if we don't burn it for energy, oil is still useful for countless other applications. Just because it is cheap and plentiful is no reason to keep wasting on legacy applications like ICEs.

 

[dmcowen674]

Is an oil free future even possible with current and forseeable future technology?

Going back to Horse and Buggy, Solar and steam is awesome.

Everything that was old is new again and right.

 

[gingermeggs]

Lets not forget it'd be damn near impossible to implement anything resembling what most European countries have in terms of public transit on a national level. Plus places like California are just driving cultures. We have public transit of various sorts here, but people still drive. It's a cultural thing.

At 50miles/hr with the stereo up, you don't feel other peoples suffering, yes what a culture!

 

[gingermeggs]

Going back to Horse and Buggy, Solar and steam is awesome.

Everything that was old is new again and right.

I see you are infected with the musically witchcraft of the Joos'-Jazz!

 

[xj0hnx]

Umm, you are wrong for many reasons.
1st, no, making it smaller would NOT increase efficiency. You would have the same poor efficiency but just be doing a smaller job. Yes that would waste less gas but that would also get less work done. Granted, most Americans dont need the oversized behemoths they do now, but I would like to worry about the efficiency at which we turn gasoline into energy and then worry about the amount used later on. If you dont understand ask the guys in the Highly Technical forum.

2nd, the government does allow small cars on the road. I dont agree with it for safety reasons but it does happen. When I lived in Ridgecrest the city government allowed golf carts on roads. People liked the idea of saving money but I didnt care for slow death traps all over the place. Actually, that must have been a state of California thing cuz the suckers did have licence plates. Anyway, I didnt care for it, and I hope they stopped doing it.
And then theres the Smart Cars. Least aptly named vehicle ever designed. Those things are death traps too, but again they are legal under current law. The problem is they are still just as inefficient as any other vehicle at burning fuel and providing forward momentum.
The hybrids are a step in the right direction but as I said before, they provide only a minor benefit on normal vehicles. We need to work harder at reducing the wasted energy.

He didn't say anything about size, he said make them lighter, and he is 100% correct. The lighter the vehicle the higher the power to weight ratio is. Of course a lighter car doesn't necessarily make it more efficient per say, the engine is still going to output the same power, just with less resistance. The real problem with IC engines and efficiency isn't the fuel, it's the materials engines are made of, they just can't take the temperatures needed to make them more efficient.